In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.That is how it all began. Not with Rivendell fellowship-forming, but with a cosy, unadventurous hobbit who loved nothing more than minding his own business. A reluctant hobbit, Bilbo Baggins, sets out to the Lonely Mountain with a spirited group of dwarves to reclaim their mountain home – and the gold within it – from the dragon Smaug. It’s often easy to forget that The Hobbit films are in fact a series of prequels to the Lord of the Ringstrilogy, where a meek hobbit of the Shire named Frodo Baggins, Bilbo’s nephew, and eight companions set out on a journey to Mount Doom to destroy the One Ring and the dark lord Sauron. This well-known story was created by British author J.R.R Tolkien, with Peter Jackson famously adapting the CBE’s work into films.

JRR Tolkien

Sequels and prequels are more often than not condemned because of their derivative or simply cloned nature but The Hobbithas always felt like a dug up treasure rather than a recreated one. It’s hard to talk about The Hobbit without drawing comparisons to Lord of the Ringsbecause they are so akin. However, one of the major differences is the presence in The Hobbitof what seems to be one of the worst current Hollywood trends: multi-part story-splitting. Splitting The Hobbitinto two was already enough for some people, but the announcement of a third film was met with much exasperation from most Hobbit fans. Nevertheless, after watching this new trilogy back-to-back, it’d be hard to find any fault in the split.

Bilbo’s journey through moral corruption and all-out war is some heavy stuff, yet the series manages to hold on to its tenderness and comedy (The Hobbit being originally a children’s book) through some admittedly horrific events; the third instalment even being the one with the darkest and lightest moments in the trilogy. Individually, each film is good but they absolutely need one other to really shine.

Finally, even though “the book is always better than the film”, and the original trilogy always better than the new one, The Hobbit trilogy is definitely worth watching. Be it for its actors, its fine directing, or the famous high fantasy world that a lot of fans have come to worship, you should definitely give The Battle of the Five Armies a go!